Contributions of the basolateral amygdala and nucleus accumbens to sustaining not just initiating cognitive effort.

Overview

Authors: Matthew L Dixon¹, Elizabeth Blevins¹, Carol S Dweck¹, Kai Görgen², Brian Knutson¹

ORCID iDs: Matthew L Dixon, Kai Görgen, Brian Knutson

Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305
Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience Berlin and Berlin Center for Advanced Neuroimaging, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of the Freie Universität Berlin and Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Berlin 10115, Germany

Institutions: Stanford University (United States); Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (Germany); Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience Berlin (Germany); Freie Universität Berlin (Germany); Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin (Germany)

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, volume 123, issue 19, article e2601231123

Dates: received 15 January 2026; accepted 12 April 2026; published online 6 May 2026; in print 12 May 2026

Type: Research article · Language: English

License: CC BY

Identifiers: DOI 10.1073/pnas.2601231123 · PMID 42090260 · PMCID PMC13167750 · OpenAlex W7160424017

Open access: hybrid, a free copy (OpenAlex)

Status: data only

Categories: cognitive (subfield)

Methods: Statistics, Smoothing, state filtering, decompositions, Machine learning, Preprocessing, fMRI & imaging

Keywords: amygdala, nucleus accumbens, effort, cognitive control, reward

MeSH: Basolateral Nuclear Complex*, Cognition*, Nucleus Accumbens*, Animals, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Memory, Short-Term, Reward (* major topic)

Topic: Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies (Cognitive Neuroscience, Neuroscience), according to OpenAlex

Funding: H and H Evergreen Foundation (H&H Evergreen Foundation) (1253352-1-GAMBF)

Citations: cited by 1 paper (Europe PMC); 85 references in the paper

Research resources: RRID:SCR_009550

Abstract

People must often sustain cognitive effort to achieve important goals. Although current models recognize that subcortical valuation regions are important for initiating such effort, they have not seen them as playing meaningful roles in sustaining effort throughout task performance. Here, we demonstrate that core subcortical valuation regions—the basolateral amygdala (BLA) and nucleus accumbens (NAcc)—contribute to sustaining cognitive effort on a challenging working memory task. First, convergent univariate and multivariate analyses revealed that the BLA and NAcc represented incentive value, cognitive effort demands, or both, during every task period (encoding, maintenance, and probe/response). Second, trial-to-trial fluctuations in BLA/NAcc multivariate value coding predicted both the strength of frontoparietal cortical engagement and behavioral performance. Third, the BLA and NAcc functionally interacted with frontoparietal regions throughout the task, suggesting that they work in a coordinated manner. These findings reveal a continuous and dynamic role for subcortical valuation regions in sustaining cognitive effort.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Code

The paper links to its data, not to its authors' code: see the Data section.

The paper's code and data availability statement is in the Data section.

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Data

Datasets cited

osf:2n5wd, at OSF; found in “Data, Materials, and Software Availability”

Data, Materials, and Software Availability

Anonymized behavioral and fMRI data have been deposited in OSF (https://osf.io/2n5wd/) (85). All other data are included in the manuscript and/or SI Appendix (http://www.pnas.org/lookup/doi/10.1073/pnas.2601231123#supplementary-materials).

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Versions

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Version 1, 28 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, issue, pages, dates, 5 authors, 5 keywords, 8 MeSH terms, 1 funder, 79 references, 1 RRID.

Cite

This paper

Dixon, M. L., Blevins, E., Dweck, C. S., Görgen, K., & Knutson, B. (2026). Contributions of the basolateral amygdala and nucleus accumbens to sustaining not just initiating cognitive effort. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 123(19), e2601231123. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2601231123

BibTeX

@article{dixon2026contributions, author = {Dixon, Matthew L and Blevins, Elizabeth and Dweck, Carol S and Görgen, Kai and Knutson, Brian}, title = {{Contributions of the basolateral amygdala and nucleus accumbens to sustaining not just initiating cognitive effort}}, journal = {Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America}, year = {2026}, month = may, volume = {123}, number = {19}, pages = {e2601231123}, publisher = {National Academy of Sciences}, issn = {0027-8424}, doi = {10.1073/pnas.2601231123}, url = {https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2601231123}, pmid = {42090260}, pmcid = {PMC13167750} }

RIS

TY - JOUR AU - Dixon, Matthew L AU - Blevins, Elizabeth AU - Dweck, Carol S AU - Görgen, Kai AU - Knutson, Brian TI - Contributions of the basolateral amygdala and nucleus accumbens to sustaining not just initiating cognitive effort T2 - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America J2 - Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A PY - 2026 DA - 2026/05/06 VL - 123 IS - 19 SP - e2601231123 SN - 0027-8424 PB - National Academy of Sciences DO - 10.1073/pnas.2601231123 UR - https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2601231123 LA - en ER -

CSL-JSON

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